Science

The Choice is Yours!

/ Kristi Meeuwse / Leave a comment

Tell me and I forget. Show me and I remember. Involve me and I understand. -Chinese Proverb

Would you want to work in a place that gave you no voice? Would you want to teach in a school that allowed you no autonomy in how you teach? What if your every day was prescribed as to what you would do, what you would say and how you would say it…

medium_2699584043As professionals, we become offended when the “higher ups” in education make decisions that affect us without including us in the decision making.  Even professional development is terribly ineffective when we just “sit and get” without any input.  Would an artist paint very often or very well if the subject of the painting was always assigned? Of course not. So why are we so reluctant to give our students choice in how they learn?

Choice.  It’s meaning is clear: an act of selecting or making a decision when faced with two or more possibilities. Choice.  It’s not just for adults.  Alfie Kohn writes a good article here about choices for children in learning.

To be clear, there is a difference between choice and free reign.  Without some control and teacher facilitation, it can be pure anarchy. Setting up the learning environment to allow for student choice is critical.  You would never open a closet to a 3 year old and ask them what they want to wear.  You would ask, “Do you want to wear this or this?”  In my room, we begin with simple choices and through a gradual release of responsibility, students eventually have multiple choices all throughout the day.

Last week we were working on the pumpkin life cycle.  By Friday, everyone was ready to show me what they had learned.  They were given 2 choices.  They could show me in Pic Collage or in Explain Everything.  Later, they will have other choices, but for now, 2 is all they need.

photo

Instructions were on the Smartboard and everyone was hard at work!

photoThis is one of the examples from Pic Collage.

This is one of the examples from Explain Everything.

When given choices, students engage and take ownership.  By learning how to make choices and make decisions at a young age, they are better equipped at these skills as they get older.  When children learn to think for themselves, they are also less likely to be easily led by others whose choices may not be as desirable.

We want our students to love the content…to love learning.  By giving choices we lessen the chance of burnout (for both students and teachers), and we increase the chances of engaged, independent thinkers.  None of us like to be told, “You have no choice in the matter.” Instead, let’s work toward, “The choice is yours!”

Today we will do exciting new things.  Let’s get to it!

One Way Sign Photo Credit:  Creative Commons

 

Engaging Students with Explain Everything

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If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough. -Albert Einstein

The blank stare…You know, the one that either says, “I have no earthly idea what you are talking about.” or “Why are you telling me this? I already know it.” I suppose there is one other possibility. Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?… Utter and complete boredom. Misconceptions and lack of engagement can both derail the learning process.

IMG_2265One of the apps we use really gets to the heart of both of those concerns.  I’ve written about Explain Everything before. It really is a robust app.  The best part is that it is easy enough for my 5 year olds, yet just as relevant and engaging for older students.  I’ve even seen a few adults having a great time creating a screen cast in this app. We used this app weekly last spring.  This past week was the first time we used it this school year. We’ve been learning about Spiders in science.  My students all drew a detailed spider picture in our Drawing Pad app and saved it to the camera roll. Then they uploaded it to Explain Everything.  We’ve been working on labeling like a scientist in our Writing Workshop so they labeled their drawings and then they recorded themselves telling about their work.  As I was showing this app to a small group, their eyes widened and they were immediately interested in doing their own.  They were very excited and had great conversations amongst themselves as they discussed the length/width of the arrows used to point to their objects.  Should it point this way or that? What if they moved this over there? Noticeably absent were questions directed at ME.  Even though this was their first time using this app, they were busy figuring things out themselves and working through ideas, thoughts and questions with their peers.

This first time with Explain Everything was very successful.  After completing their assignment, they uploaded it to Showbie where I could then see and listen to each one.  As the year progresses, Explain Everything will always be one of their go-to apps to share with me what they have learned.  As we work on unpacking standards and demonstrating learning, my students have voice and choice in how they want to document what they know.

While iPads are often thought of as a consumptive device, through the use of creation apps, students are able to create their own content.  Explain Everything allows students to create both simple and complex presentations in an engaging way in any subject. Our first product this week is more simple but they will become more complex as the year goes on.  This is Caitlyn’s Explain Everything:

Want to lose the blank stares? Engage students, get to the heart of what they know and don’t know, and stimulate their minds and their conversations.   Any takers?  Anyone?  Anyone?

Today we will do exciting new things.  Let’s get to it!

Using iPads to Transform Teaching and Learning

/ Kristi Meeuwse / 2 Comments

Every great advance in science has issued from a new audacity of imagination.-John Dewey

ThomasOne of the great things I’ve noticed in the last 2 years is how my teaching has evolved with the use of the iPads.  It’s been a gradual shift, but the way I am using them now is different than the first pilot year in 2011.

In the beginning, I was focused on integrating the iPads into our day and was very much “app” oriented.  We had a lot of success that first year and my class data reflected that.

A subtle shift began last year when my students started taking charge of their own learning.  It wasn’t exactly planned, but the environment was supportive and I was open to their ideas.  Soon, they were creating content and not just interacting with apps.  They were blogging, writing, and reading on the iPad. I was thrilled with the student-centered learning environment.

This year, I’ve learned from my students, we’ve raised the bar, and kids continue to create their own content.  They are teaching other students in other classes and other grade levels, and they are articulating their learning in a variety of ways.  They are choosing how they want to demonstrate their learning and I am facilitating their choices.  I indicate what skills we are working on and they decide how they want to learn it and how they want to demonstrate their learning.  Their choices are far more involved and detailed than anything I would’ve imagined.  They are integrating multiple apps to create a finished product.  They can articulate what they are learning and how to demonstrate their learning.

Here is an example from Explain Everything.  This child was demonstrating plant parts.

I have no idea what next school year will bring (and goodness knows, I am looking forward to enjoying my summer break!), but the outlook is bright.  I am excited about learning from the other Apple Distinguished Educators this summer at the institute and bringing that knowledge back to my classroom.

Wherever you are in your classroom journey, it’s important to reflect on where you are and where you’ve been.  It’s important to celebrate your successes, no matter how small, and then be willing to move forward and try new things.  Daring to imagine the possibilities and being willing to change is not just transforming to your own teaching, it will transform your classroom in ways you never thought were possible.

Today, we will do exciting new things.  Let’s get to it!

Technology Infused Classrooms

/ Kristi Meeuwse / 3 Comments

The love of learning, the sequestered nooks,
And all the sweet serenity of books.- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Luc landformsWhat does a technology-infused classroom look like?  If it’s done correctly, the technology becomes invisible.  It is seamless.  The teacher scaffolds and creates a curriculum-based lesson, then steps back and allows the students to make the magic.

In my classroom, I’ve  intentionally modeled procedures and through the gradual release of responsibility, my students are independent during their work time.  I’m not interrupted while teaching guided reading groups as students incorporate peer collaboration into their skill sets.  Once my students have learned how to use their apps, they are able to then demonstrate their learning in a creative way they choose.

It is not uncommon to see students in the reading center reading eBooks on their iPads asElla making a book well as regular paper books.  At the writing center, there will be children making books in Book Creator as well as writing out long hand on paper.  Ella, pictured at right, chose to skip her free choice centers today to go write a book on her iPad.  On Monday, she chose to write about her weekend news during Writer’s Workshop.  She wrote 6 pages on lined paper.  Her method of delivery differs but she is demonstrating the skills

With a technology infused classroom, students can make their own decisions.  They are engaged and motivated.  In kindergarten, the infusion is slow and deliberate.  It becomes a natural part of our every day routine so that we don’t have to work at it.  We don’t have “iPad time”.  It an extension of our learning. We don’t just add technology and stir.  We use the technology for information, research, collaboration and creation of products.

By being deliberate, having a plan, and empowering your students, creating a technology infused classroom is easy.

Today, we will do exciting new things.  Let’s get to it!

Hope Explains Everything on iPad

/ Kristi Meeuwse / 8 Comments

Grown-ups never understand anything for themselves, and it is tiresome for children to be always and forever explaining things to them. -Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Have you ever listened to a 5 year old tell about their work? Try listening to 25 of them.  Daily.  They have so much they want to tell and explain that I don’t have enough ears to listen to it all.  Their work is so detailed and there are like 40 bajillion things they absolutely must tell, and if you interrupt them even once, they must.  start.  over.

Hope

Hope

Thank goodness I have Explain Everything.  It is the perfect app for my kids to demonstrate their workflow, show me what they have learned and talk, talk, talk to their hearts content.  If they mess up, they just erase and start over.  My kids are learning about labeling and annotating their work.  Scientists label and good readers annotate for meaning.  When I showed them the app, someone said, “You mean I can just tell my iPad everything I want it to know?”  Yes…within 13.8 GB of reason.  So with full permission to illustrate, write, label, annotate AND talk, this lesson was a home run. There is an example from Hope, one of my students at the end of this post.

Ok…so a small caveat.  I have a slight obsession with neat and orderly and it’s hard for me to do messy.  (Yes, I realize I teach kindergarten.  Somehow it all works.)  This activity can get messy.  I had to get over my urge to tidy it up and put it all in a bento box and say that’s, that. You can’t have kids recording all over the classroom while other kids are talking and recording at the same time.  So, as kids finished their illustrations, labeling and annotations, I allowed 4 at a time to go out in the hall, spread themselves out, and tell their story.  I actually had to tell them it was ok to speak up so they could be heard by the recorder.

We will be using this approach with demonstrating mastery of math standards as well in the coming weeks.  Explain Everything is not free…There are other apps, like Show Me that does similar things that is free.

As my kids are working on many different kinds of fluencies, stretching their cognitive wings and needing to share what they’ve learned, having the iPad allows my kids to create, produce, redefine and transform all in one place.

Please allow Hope to Explain Everything:

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Workflow and iPads

/ Kristi Meeuwse / 2 Comments

Don’t mistake activity for achievement.-John Wooden

boys workingIn a recent post, I wrote about moving beyond apps and concentrating your focus on content. What are your students learning, why are they learning it and how will they know they’ve learned it? As I unpack the common core standards with my students, I am focusing heavily on these questions…not so that I can answer them, but so that they can answer them.  With these questions in place and iPads in hand, we need to look beyond apps and instead focus on workflow fluency.

If you look up the definition of workflow, you find:

  1. The flow or progress of work done by a company, industry, department, or person.
  2. The rate at which such flow or progress takes place.

The flow of progress…how can my students demonstrate the flow of progress?  Just because they are interacting with an app does not mean they are learning.  iPad activity should be purposeful and connected.  It should also be personalized to what that particular child needs.  

Workflow and iPads allow students to redefine their work.  The technology allows for the creation of new tasks previously inconceivable.  It is transformative.  After our recent thematic unit on penguins, my students created their own books in Book Creator. workflowThis started with their own illustrations in Doodle Buddy which were imported into their book in Book Creator.  The students wrote sentences to go with their own illustrations.  Taking this a little further, students took some of their individual illustrations and labeled them using Explain Everything. They were able to record themselves explaining their work.  While the apps I used in this are great, there are others that do similar things.  Some of them are free.  Pic Collage is another way to demonstrate workflow and it’s free. The take away here is that students are able to use the iPad to demonstrate what they’ve learned and can use apps to explain in their own words what they’ve learned.

As we are striving to make learning more personal, we should teach our students about workflow fluency. By using the iPad to demonstrate workflow, our students are engaged, thinking critically, and are using skills of a 21st century learner.  Even the youngest among us can do it.

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Kids Teaching Kids with Book Creator

/ Kristi Meeuwse / 20 Comments

collageKnowledge exists to be imparted.-Ralph Waldo Emerson

For a short time, I considered that it was highly possible I had lost my mind.  I was going to teach my kids how to use Book Creator on a Friday. Not only that, they were going to teach another kindergarten class how to use it later in the day.  Simmer down…my sanity is still intact.  I worried needlessly.  My iPad proficient five year olds created a 4 page book on Penguins in less than an hour.  They illustrated their pictures in Doodle Buddy, saved them to the camera roll, imported them into Book Creator, typed their text and exported the book to their iBooks app in the morning.  I demonstrated how to do this on the SmartBoard prior to their starting on their own.

In the afternoon, we hosted another kindergarten class to come learn from us.  At one penguin bookspoint, there were 50 kids in my classroom.  They were in groups of 2 or 4, working together.  By the end of our session, the other class had at least the book cover completed and some had their first page finished.  My children loved, loved, loved teaching them.  The engagement was instant.  Their conversations were instructive, relevant, and meaningful.  There were conversations about word choice and details in illustrations.  We even discussed getting back together and sharing our finished books with each other.

My students, in the end, wanted to know if they could show another class how to create their own books.  What a great way for all of my students to have an opportunity to be a leader.  Even the quiet and reserved students, who may otherwise be reluctant to share in front of the group, took a leadership role in the small groups.  While the finished products are going to look great, the process in getting there was priceless.  Not to be forgotten, the science facts they acquired as they wrote about penguins, their life cycle, and their habitats.  Combine that with the literacy aspect and the cooperative learning on the iPads, and I’d say today was a complete success.

Here is a screen shot of one of the book covers:

book cover

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Doodle Buddy and Science Drawings

/ Kristi Meeuwse / 2 Comments

Touch a scientist and you touch a child.-Ray Bradbury

October and November are great months in the South.  Fall and cooler weather are a nice respite from the stifling hot Charleston summers.  It is also a great opportunity to explore fall and harvest in science.  There are many ways to create science journals on the iPad.  You can use Pages, whiteboard apps, or any number of drawing apps.  We’ve been using Doodle Buddy.  It is a free drawing app.  My students can create a drawing and save to their photo roll.  Once created, they can then import the drawing into their writing.  We like to import into Pages as well as Book Creator.

Here is an example of one child’s science journal.  We were discussing pumpkin life cycles.  After reading a book, From Seed to Pumpkin, many students wanted to draw the life cycle in their Doodle Buddy app.  From this, the child can type directly on the drawing with the keyboard or he can import it into Pages or Book Creator.  Each stage of the life cycle could be broken down into one page each, with this image above being used as the culminating page.  This is a great sequencing activity as well.

When I introduced Doodle Buddy, I connected my iPad to the SmartBoard and demonstrated how to use the app and how to save the drawing.  It is very simple to use and my students caught on immediately.  It always amazes me how engaged they are when they are creating on the iPad.  Their language was rich with inquiry and science vocabulary.  After creating, they love to share.  When they create, they are more likely to internalize important concepts.  Critical thinking is occurring.  There was no doubt in my mind after looking at their diagrams that they understood this plant life cycle concept.

By having these drawings on their iPads, they are also able to re-visit their work and add to it if interested.  Learning is extended and interest is maintained.  Even though it is still early in the school year for these young scientists, their enthusiasm for science is evident.

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PaperDesk App for iPad

/ Kristi Meeuwse / 2 Comments

I’ve been writing in notebooks for 40 years or so.-Frank McCourt

I’ve always loved different kinds of paper, notepads, note cards, journals, etc…I love to own them, but I’m stingy about using them.  I’m also a list person.  I have Post-It notes everywhere to remind me of things.  I’ve started putting a lot of notes and reminders in my iPhone for convenience and I love having it all in one place.

I recently  found the PaperDesk app.  PaperDesk is the best way to take notes without dragging around loads of paper, notebooks, pencils, and pens to your next class or meeting. PaperDesk is a fun, easy-to-use notebook replacement made specifically for the iPad.  PaperDesk allows you to keep a “desk” full of your notebooks. You have unlimited notebooks with an unlimited number of pages in the full PaperDesk app! You also have all of the most popular exporting options, including Dropbox, in the full PaperDesk app. Autosync to Dropbox to ensure your notes are at your fingertips anywhere you go.  The app is $4.99 but there is a lite version. In the lite version, you are limited to 3 notebooks with 3 pages per notebook and no exporting options.

Here are some highlights:

Typing:
• 58 Fonts, colors, bold, italic, and underline formatting options
• Custom characters built into on-screen keyboard
• Automatic bulleted and numbered lists

Drawing:
• Color picker with thousands of colors
• Rest your wrist on screen while drawing
• Smooth, gel ink
• 20 level undo support for text or drawing

Importing (not available in PaperDesk Lite):
• Import PDFs from other apps, Dropbox, or iTunes (up to ~180 pgs per PDF)
• Insert images from photo library or camera

Exporting (not available in PaperDesk Lite):
• Dropbox
• GoogleDocs
• Email
• Twitter
• AirPrint

Organization:
• Bookmark pages to navigate easily
• Search all of your notebooks in seconds
• Keep a task list in each notebook, with in-app notifications
• Organize notebooks and folders by name or date
• Animated folders for notebooks

I haven’t used this in my classroom yet.  I’ve just downloaded it for myself.  However, I see it as particularly useful for students in keeping things organized, for science or math journals, observations, taking notes or drawings.  PaperDesk gives you all the benefits of a simple pad of paper – with all the benefits of note taking on the iPad!

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Exploring Science

/ Kristi Meeuwse / 3 Comments

Men love to wonder, and that is the seed of science. -Ralph Waldo Emerson

Young children are curious about the world around them and eager to explore it. This curiosity is reflected in the numerous questions that children pose in everyday conversations at home and in school. However, at the beginning of school, young children are afforded few opportunities to engage systematically and thoughtfully in learning science. On average, less than 10% of instructional time is spent on teaching science in the early grades.  Time is a precious commodity in the classroom…so how do we fit it all in?

One of the ways we incorporate science is through our thematic units.  We also explore science themes through informational texts.  One of my reading groups was reading a leveled book on weather.  The informational text was written on this group’s reading level.  After reading the book and discussing different kinds of weather, we used our iPads as both a reading response/science journal.  Using our Whiteboard App, the children wrote about weather.  Kaylee wrote about a sunny day.  This was their first experience using the iPad keyboard.  They were excited about creating this assignment on their iPads.  There was a lot of good discussion among the children about which type of weather they would choose and how they would represent that on the iPad. One of the best ways to incorporate scientific skills in young children is to help them verbalize what they have observed.  Doing this activity in the small guided reading group made it very manageable.  The children already knew how to use Whiteboard in its basic form, how to change their colors, draw, erase, and save…but had not used the keyboard function before.  We had to discuss a few keyboard basics-space bar, backspace to erase, and how to hide the keyboard when finished.

Carl Sagan, the famous astronomer and writer, said that all children start out as scientists, full of curiosity and questions about the world around them.  We can tap into that natural potential by engaging students in hands-on activities, and in class discussions that help students discover simple but amazing facts about the world around them. The iPads serve as a tool to facilitate and extend the learning.

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